The term "WP hosting" is going to be a gimmick in most cases. That's much like saying "managed vps" or "managed server" by the DC. The sellers know full well that this is a way to double, even triple the pricing, and yeah, they will try to pull this off.

That's not saying that "WP hosting" doesn't exist. There are a few shops that are WP exclusive, that specialize in WP and know everything there is to know about it, it's plugins, how to get the best of the best from it.
Unfortunately, these hosts are not 'cheap' by any means. If you're paying less than $30/domain for WP hosting then it's not a true WP host. Remember, professionals aren't cheap, kids. No matter what people from certain third world countries tell you, they're not.

As far as 'fully managed' and 'managed' WP hosting? I don't really see a difference here. This would be way more than that $30/domain price, and would have to include everything for the user. From posts to updates to editing the theme. Again, time is money, and it's not cheap

What sets the WordPress-specific packages apart from standard shared hosting is that they're typically optimized stacks for WP.

If you want to see what an optimized WP stack looks like check out EasyEngine - it's an automated installer for Debian/Ubuntu that basically takes a fresh OS install and sets up everything you need for a high performance WP site. My personal favourite option is the --wpfc flag when creating a site, which sets up the install to use memcached for database + object caching, then Nginx's cache for static pages. Works great.

The difference between managed & fully managed - not a clue. Most of the 'managed' guys basically just handle the updates for you and do checks for plugin compatibility, etc.

It's fancy application-specific shared hosting with a custom panel and good support (usually).

I think WordPress Hosting would mean they have a dedicated server(s) optimized for wordpress. Managed WordPress would refer to the support they give you if and when your site requires help with optimization, plugins etc. Fully Managed WordPress whould be when you are charged extra for what you should have gotten in Managed WordPress LOL.

I answered this in another forum and thought it would be helpful to pass along here too.

WordPress hosting - Marketing Gimmick. Usually just a shared account renamed as a WordPress package. Also usually on a cPanel host and offered through a one-click option, alongside emails, dns, add-on's, and 250+ other scripts that can be installed in the same account.

Customer - someone starting out or has low traffic.

Managed WordPress Hosting - An actual WordPress host. Usually not using cPanel or any panel. Has an optimized setup that doesn't use Apache, and has staff trained in server management and WordPress. No emails, dns, or anything else not needed for WordPress.

Customer - someone who relies on their website and may have moderate to high traffic.

Fully Managed WordPress Hosting - Word play and the same as Managed..although we all know for some, managed just means they reboot and tell the customer it's online, or they actually cover everything.

When I see these debates, it reminds me of an older import car I had in high school from my brother. It wasn't fancy, but it also wasn't one of the common domestic cars. I had a mechanic that my brother sent me to who would only work on those make of car. One time I needed an oil change I figured I would go to the Canadian Tire 5 minutes from my school since my mechanic was a 45 minute drive away. After the car was on the hoist for 20 or 30 minutes, the guy came to ask me where the filter was. Luckily I knew and showed him. My mechanic wouldn't need to ask such questions.

Same story relates to hosting;

Send a ticket to the common "any host can host WordPress" and go back and forth with responses for hours, to only be told to get your own help. Or go with a host that specializes in WordPress and have the issue resolved from the initial ticket.

Also some will factor in price and say it's too much. A client who knows and understands business will never think this way. If their hosting cost them $1200 a year, they're the type of client that could afford to pay this and will sleep well at night knowing that $1200 expense helped them make $90,000. Or even if they pay monthly, that $100 a month expense helped them make $2000 that month. A smart business person understands their time, and knows that the $5 a month host will cost them $200,000 of lost income, or that $100 will let them sleep at night.

Another thought when it comes to price...If a $100 a month expense is too much, then imagine those who run a business where just the monthly lease is $2000 before any other expenses are factored including the cost of starting that business.

I haven't made a music business analogy in a while, but a true WordPress Host (or Managed) are like music artists that make music for the love of music. Such host were doing just WordPress before it became cool. The artists you hear on the radio everyday making the garbage music...those are the WordPress hosts that do it for marketing. Theses hosts pay affiliate sites to fool the public, like record labels pay dj's and radio stations to make a song #1 over night.

Actually, they're not a 'creation of hosts'.
There is a need for true managed wordpress hosting. However, most hosts use this as a gimmick to charge you more, because they can.

More than three times I signed up for wordpress hosting (Just to see how others were doing it) and It always ended up just regular hosting with non-regular price.

Yes there is need for Wordpress hosting and if you need extra support with your wordpress then Managed Wordpress Hosting BUT make me understand where that Fully Managed Wordpress came from at the level of User need?

Our WordPress and Magento hosting products are basic "shared hosting", but we do use LiteSpeed Enterprise Web Server, which has LSCWP plugin for Wordpress and LiteMage for Magento, which are caching plugins that work directly with the web server and are much faster than anything else currently on offer in the market.

Our machines have obscene amounts of memory and CloudLinux optimumcache (de-duplicating cache, so we don't cache Wordpress or Magento core files over and over), as we believe serving pages from memory is much faster that SSD.

Backed up multiple times per hour, with self-service restore you know that even if you have a lazy week and don't apply those critical updates and you site gets compromised you can restore to one of many backup snapshots.

Of course, optional automated updates, via softaculous, could avoid many problems, but if you prefer not to update as it might break your site, Patchman will patch any exploitable code in your Wordpress/Magento site or theme that it finds on its daily scan, after giving you the option to fix it yourself first.

BitNinja meanwhile sits on the outside monitoring the behaviour of IPs and feeding back to their central server, whilst getting intelligence reports and bans from them in real-time.

We have our own specific algorithms which trawl the logs of Wordpress and Magento and ban the IPs of people slowly-slowly testing the sites.

Now other hosts may have also combined all of this technology and added their own, as the majority is available for purchase, and added their own propriety tech to it as well as we have.

If they have are they then allowed to say this is "Wordpress Hosting" or "Magento Hosting"?

As what point is your hosting so good that you can claim it "Product X Hosting"

I don't know about others, but I'd sleep a little better knowing I can revert my site back to any hour in the last week or any day in the last month
That my host in encouraging me to upgrade regularly and giving me the tools to do it and even patching the individual vulnerabilities when I am not able to upgrade.

You usually get what you pay for, so choose carefully and watch out for the hosts who seem to be saving pennies, as they are likely to cost you pounds in the long run.

I would like to recommend you, please contact hosting provider before purchasing such hosting and ask them to provide you terms and condition about Wordpress related hosting and read it carefully to avoid any problem in future

As wordpress is the most common one, most hosting companies try to take advantage of this and as a result most of these phrases started spreading. But there are some hosts which might be true to their plans and need to find out those which is a tedious task.

If you ask me to define these 3 phrases I will do those like the below

WordPress hosting : Normally will just provide best environment to support wordpress and wordpress caching plugins so that users can get the best speed for the sites. Most of the shared servers can be made wordpress hosting type by some changes like adding extra caching like memcached / APC etc and also adding varnish/nginx/php-fpm etc.

Managed WordPress Hosting : I will say this should be like Managed server (like a docker instance which is fully compatible for wordpress hosting ) and that instance will be managed by that hosting team .

Fully Managed WordPress Hosting : In this they should host / manage server / develop and help in wordpress development level issues as well and even should help them to rebuid the site using a new theme as well.

It depends on the provider. Many use these terms loosely as they see a successful provider offering these fully managed WP plans, that may have grown quickly as they actually do offer what they say, which leads to copycats whose definition of support and optimization may be completely different. There really are no standards when it comes to many definitions in the hosting industry, unfortunately. Do your research, ask sales questions up front.